“These came for you, Miss Knight.” The doorman handed over a dozen long-stemmed red roses. Theta stifled a yawn as she ripped open the envelope on the card.
“ ‘A rose for a rose. With my dearest affections, Clarence M. Potts.’ Oh, brother!” Theta shoved the flowers back at him. “Give these to your girl, Eddie. Just toss the card first, or you’ll be in hot water.”
“Oh, you can’t throw those roses away. They’re the bee’s knees!” Evie blurted.
Theta squinted at her. “These stems? They’re from creepy Mr. Potts. He’s forty-eight, and he’s had four wives. I’m only seventeen, and I’m not looking to walk the middle aisle and be wife number five. I know plenty of chorus girls who’re regular gold diggers, but not me, sister. I got plans.” She nodded to Mabel. “Heya. Madge, right?”
“Mabel. Mabel Rose.”
“Nice to meet ya, Mabel.” Theta fixed her liquid gaze on Evie. “And you are?”
“Evangeline O’Neill. But everyone calls me Evie.”
“Theta Knight. You can call me anything—just not before noon.” She produced a cigarette from her pajama pocket and waited for the doorman to light it, which he did. “Thanks, Eddie.”
“Evie’s staying with her uncle, Mr. Fitzgerald,” Mabel explained. “She’s from Ohio.”
“Sorry,” Theta deadpanned.
“You said it—and how! Are you from New York?”
Theta arched a thread-thin eyebrow. “Everybody in New York’s from someplace else.”
Evie decided she liked Theta. It was hard not to be taken by her glamour. She’d never known anyone in Ohio who lived on her own terms, wore silk men’s pajamas into a public lobby, and could toss a dozen roses like they were a cup of Automat coffee. “Are you really a Ziegfeld girl?”
“Guilty.”
“That must be terribly exciting!”
“It’s a living,” Theta said on a stream of smoke. “You should come to the show some night.”
Evie thrilled at the thought. A Ziegfeld show! “I’d love to.”
“Swell. Name your night and I’ll leave a coupla tickets for you both. Well, I’d love to stay and beat my gums, but if I’m gonna hit on all sixes later, I gotta grab my beauty sleep. Swell to meet ya, Evil.”
“It’s Evie.”
“Not anymore,” Theta called over her shoulder as she disappeared into the elevator.
“I can’t believe you’re really here,” Mabel said. She and Evie were seated in the Bennington’s down-at-heel dining room having a couple of club sandwiches and Coca-Colas. “What did you do to get drummed out of Ohio so quickly?”
Evie toyed with the ice in her glass. “Remember that little trick I told you about a few months ago? Well…” Evie told Mabel the story of Harold Brodie’s ring. “And the terrible thing is that I’m right, and he comes off looking like the wronged party, the hypocrite!”
“Gee whiz,” Mabel said.
Evie studied Mabel’s face carefully. “Oh, Mabesie. You believe me, don’t you?”
“Of course I do.”
“And you don’t think I’m some sort of sideshow act?”
“Never.” Mabel swirled the ice in her glass, thinking. “But I wonder why you’re suddenly able to do it. You didn’t fall and hit your head or something, did you?”
Evie arched a brow. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t mean anything by it! I just thought there might be a medical reason. A scientific reason,” Mabel said hastily. “Did you tell your uncle about it?”
Evie shook her head emphatically. “I’m not rocking the boat. Everything’s copacetic with Unc right now, and I want it to stay that way.”
Mabel bit her lip. “And did you meet Jericho?”
“I did indeed,” Evie said, finishing her Coca-Cola.
“What did you think?” Mabel asked, leaning in.
“Very… solid.”
Mabel let out a small squeak. “Isn’t he beautiful?”
Evie thought about the Jericho she’d just met—quiet, serious, sober Jericho. There was nothing remotely seductive about him. “He is to you, and that’s what matters. So what have you done about this situation?”
“Well… last Friday, when we were both standing at the mailboxes?”
“Yes?” Evie wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.
“I stood very close to him….”
“Uh-huh.”
“And I said, just like this, ‘Nice day, isn’t it?’ ”
“And?”
“And that was it. Well, he said yes. So we were both in agreement about the weather.”
Evie collapsed against the banquette. “Holy smokes. It’s like a party without any confetti. What we need is a plan, old girl. A romantic assault of epic proportions. We will shake the walls of Jericho! That boy won’t know what hit him.”
Mabel perked up. “Swell! What’s the plan?”
Evie shrugged. “Beats me. I just know we need one.”
“Oh,” Mabel said.
“Oh, Mabesie, sugar. Don’t worry about that. I’ll think of something. In the meantime, we’ll visit the shops, go see Theta in ‘No Foolin’ ’ at the Follies—I’ll bet she knows all the hot spots—Charleston till we drop. We are going to live, kiddo! I intend to make this the most exciting four months of our lives. And, if I play my cards right, I’ll stay on.” Evie danced in her seat. “So where are your folks tonight?”
Mabel flushed. “Oh. There’s a rally for the appeal of Sacco and Vanzetti downtown. My mother and father are representing The Proletariat,” she said, reminding Evie of the name of the socialist newspaper Mabel’s parents operated and distributed. “I’d be there but, well, I couldn’t not see you on your first night in town!”
“Well, I suppose I’ll see them tomorrow.”
Mabel’s face clouded. She shook her head. “My mother will be speaking to the women’s garment workers union. And Papa’s got the newspaper to see to. They do so much for so many.”
Mabel’s letters were filled with stories of her parents’ crusading efforts in the city. It was clear that she was very proud of them. It was also clear that their causes left them with little time or energy for their daughter.
Evie patted Mabel’s hand. “It’s just as well. Parents get in the way. My mother is impossible since she caught the disease.”
Mabel looked stricken. “Oh, dear. What’s she got?”
A slow smile stretched the corners of Evie’s lips. “Temperance. In the extreme.”
Their laughter was interrupted by the approach of two elderly ladies. “That is not how young ladies behave in the social sphere, Miss Rose. This carrying-on is most unseemly.”
“Yes, Miss Proctor,” Mabel said, chastened. Evie made a face that only Mabel could see, and Mabel had to bite her lip to keep from laughing again. “Miss Lillian, Miss Adelaide, may I present Miss Evie O’Neill. Miss O’Neill is staying with her uncle, Mr. Fitzgerald, for a time.” Under the table, Mabel’s foot pressed Evie’s in warning.
Miss Lillian smiled. “Oh, how lovely. And what a sweet face. Doesn’t she have a sweet face, Addie?”
“Very sweet, indeed.”
The Misses Proctor wore their long gray hair curled like turn-of-the-century schoolgirls. The effect was odd and disconcerting, like porcelain dolls who had aged and wrinkled.
“Welcome to the Bennington. It’s a grand old place. Once upon a time, it was considered one of the very best addresses in the city,” Miss Lillian continued.
“It’s swell. Um, lovely. A lovely place.”
“Yes. Sometimes you might hear odd sounds in the night. But you mustn’t be frightened. This city has its ghosts, you see.”
“All the best places do,” Evie said with mock-seriousness.
Mabel choked on her Coca-Cola, but Miss Lillian did not take note. “In the seventeen hundreds, this patch of land was home to those suffering from the fever. Those poor, tragic souls moaning in their tents, jaundiced and bleeding, their vomitus the color of black night!”
Evie pushed her sandwich away. “How hideously fascinating. I was just saying to Mabel—Miss Rose—that we don’t talk enough about black vomit.” Under the table, Mabel’s foot threatened to push Evie’s through the floor.